What is Share of Voice?
Share of voice measures what proportion of the total visibility in your market you hold - originally in advertising weight, today just as much in search results, snippets, social mentions and AI citations. The key word is "share": it is not about absolute presence, but about your presence relative to your competitors.
The metric is so useful because it correlates with growth. The advertising-effectiveness work of Les Binet and Peter Field, drawing on years of IPA data, shows that brands whose share of voice sits above their market share - their excess share of voice - tend to gain market share. Visibility above your own weight buys future growth.
In a zero-click world, share of voice becomes a more honest headline metric than the click. The question then is: what proportion of the answers, snippets and AI citations in your topics carries your name? That signal moves more slowly than a traffic curve, but it measures exactly what matters now - presence at the point of decision.
Why does Share of Voice matter?
The rule from advertising-effectiveness research (Binet and Field): when your share of voice sits above your market share, market share tends to grow. Visibility above your own weight is not a luxury - it is the engine of growth.
Share of Voice in practice
- 01A provider with 10 per cent market share that holds 20 per cent of the relevant search results and AI citations - excess share of voice that pays into future growth.
- 02A monitoring setup that counts how many AI Overviews for the core questions feature your own brand - relative to three competitors.
- 03A B2B provider measuring its share of the LinkedIn conversation on a topic, not just its own follower count.
